About Dipti

67% of the country is covered by forests! We flew into Kuala Lumpur International Airport (KLIA), which features a natural rainforest in the middle of the terminal. Coming from the desert, I was only too elated to see so much green!

Much has happened on the personal and professional front in the last few months since Nepal in April that we deserved a mini-break early September. We chose Malaysia, and agreed on doing a Yin vacation! While initially, I wanted to make the most of the 8 days, better sense prevailed and we decided to take it easy, having a fabulous time in the process.

The itinerary was nothing out-of-the-box but enough to keep us busy the whole length:

Langkawi was as beautiful as it’s made out to be. It also helped that we were present during off-season and hence crowds were sparse.

A considerable part of Penang time was spent in search of vegetarian ‘Malay’ food which, for your information, doesn’t exist (i’m not counting Indian cuisine here, which is available in plenty). And then I discovered the small but popular world of Sino-Buddhist cuisine in Georgetown, the capital!

Kuala Lumpur was as interesting as a big city could be. We had a wonderful view of the Twin towers from our room, feasted on a widespread breakfast buffet and watched a lovely musical of the city’s history.

This vacation had a few firsts for us, one of them being alcohol-free!

I loved the little I saw of Malaysia! Like many other places, a week or two just doesn’t justify taking in all that a country has to offer. If I could come again, I would – and it would be East Malaysia and perhaps a trek up Kota Kinabalu!

But overall, a much awaited detox trip. Some pictures below, more coming soon!

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Note: This post is not really on travel but rather a problem that I faced because of my travel document. Hence relevant only to those with an Indian passport and living in certain countries outside India.

I made a brief weekend trip to India in July to attend a wedding. On my return, at the Emirates check-in counter of Bangalore International airport, I wasn’t allowed to exit and board the flight to Dubai. Eh, why? Because I had an ‘ECR’ stamp on my passport.

I have been in Dubai for the last 3 years, made a couple of trips to India and never faced this problem. However recently, I moved to my own work visa, having been earlier being on a spouse visa. What I didn’t realize was that my passport when issued and renewed, had an ECR stamp.

However, the Ministry of Overseas Indian Affairs (Emigration Policy Division) have allowed ECR passport holders traveling abroad for purposes others than employment to leave the country on production of valid passport, valid visa and return ticket at the immigration counters at international airports in India w.e.f. 1st October 2007.”

So effectively, I wasn’t allowed to pass immigration and what followed was figuring out how I’d get my passport renewed when all my original documents were back home in Dubai. It meant spending atleast a week in Bangalore, dealing with the Passport Office there and its known bureaucracy, arranging for the papers to be couriered, missing days of work and getting a new passport before I could ‘legally’ exit India.

And then we did something crazy. But legal, I must add.

In short, I used a valid 6-month UK visa and exited India. It was the quickest way out of this unwanted mess. I had no problems at Indian immigration and of course, there was never an issue with entering Dubai. All in all, a stressful 24 hours. And an expensive one too. But all’s well that ends well.

So this one’s for those of you NRI’s, who issued or renewed the passport in the past and not realised that some idiotic passport officer didn’t check your educational qualification and stamped an ‘ECR’ on the passport. Get that rectified now.

I have to get my passport renewed at the Indian consulate in Dubai (which I assume should be far less complicated) so that I can enter my country-of-origin again without fear of being held back again!

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Taking on from my last post on Nepal, I was looking forward to detail our week long adventure trekking around the Annapurna circuit and the days spent loitering in and around Pokhara and Kathmandu.

But what a depressing last 24 hours it has been. Tuned into news of the terrible earthquake just as it broke where the anchors were speculating possible loss of lives. Went out to buy groceries and 5 hours later, the number was 1400 dead and counting.

2 weeks earlier, we were in Kathmandu. We debated whether to lunch at a local Newari restaurant at Durbar Square, stayed overnight at the touristy area of Thamel and did a brisk 2-hours shopping in its crowded streets before taking the flight out from Tribhuvan International.

Wouldn’t it cross your mind of how it could have been you, how this could have happened 2 weeks back or how we could have taken this vacation 2 weeks later?

Oh unpredictable life.

This only reinforces that tomorrow is not in my hands, not in our hands.

That we need to make the most of life today, to live for the moment and do what makes us happy and spread that cheer around. To travel while we can and make a difference in our lives and hopefully that of others.

For now, yesterday is a bagful of wonderful memories. Of hospitable, smiling nepali people that we encountered. Some of whom we took photos of. Of Rajender & Amrut, our guide and porter. Of a baby that gurgled as I passed by a village where his mom was selling hand-made jewelery. Can only desperately wish that they are safe.

We flew into Kathmandu and after an overnight of noise and dust, got into the mountainous city of Pokhara.

A 4 day trek was the highlight of our Nepal holiday:

Highlight 1 – My idea of fitness was put to shame and how

Highlight 2 – The locals could go to any ‘heights’ to please palates of trekking tourists

Highlight 3 – We were possibly the only Indian trekkers in those 4 days

Highlight 4 – An obvious highlight but to re-emphasize, the snow covered mountains were breathtaking (in more ways than one).

Highlight 5 – With a disciplined eating schedule (no snacking, none at all) and great deal of physical exertion, my body got into a wonderful detox & purge mode. And for the best interest of you, dear reader, we shall not delve into that any further.

Our schedule went thus:

Day 0 & 1 – Kathmandu & Pokhara

Day 2 – Nayapul to Ulleri via Tikhegundha

Day 3 – Ghorepani and Poonhill

Day 4 – Tadapani

Day 5 – Downhill to Ghandruk

Day 6 & 7 – Pokhara & Kathmandu

Detailed account coming soon; some pics of the beautiful country below.

Billboard at airport

Pokhara countryside

Trekking path

Rhododendrons, national flower of Nepal

Buddhist flags along the way

Passing village, Nepali children

One of the (many) handsome looking canines! Not particularly happy, is he?

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We are planning the next vacation. Which is exactly a month from now. And nothing has been done as yet.

While having an Indian passport is a lot better than many others, it is still a long-drawn application procedure if you want to visit countries around the UAE’s proximity. I have a deadline of 2 days for looking up a list of countries offering visa-on-arrival for Indians and rounding up on the shortlist. Watch this space.

Next comes the quintessential question of how you want to visit a new place. As a Tourist or Traveller?

Yin is the tourist. He believes that with a steady job and limited vacation time, one should fly non-stop and not necessarily on a low-frills flight. ‘2 vacations a year is what we can afford so splurge’ is his mantra. Yin is Mr. Organised and would want his tickets and schedule well before he embarks on the holiday. The idea is to check in to a well-known hotel, not necessarily luxury, but one that has a pool, gym and the works. With a 7 day timeframe, he prefers an itinerary of possibly 2 small countries, flying through the popular and key cities (oh yes, a low fare flight should be fine here), spending a couple of days in each, eating/drinking at a nice restaurant and heading back. If he had his way, it would be taking one of those customized packaged tours during the day and spending the evening sipping over a malt and reading a book. His goal is clear: Only 1 week so make the most of it, have a good time, and importantly, do not compromise on comfort.

Yang is the traveller. Her idea of a holiday is to spend no less than 2 weeks in exploring a small country. But then she cannot afford to get fired from her job. She will spend days monitoring flight sites for the cheapest fare (that said, she likes an expensive direct flight too with the gourmet meal n drink, I mean who doesn’t? If it were free, that is). She could spend weeks researching Bed & Breakfasts and home-stays, eventually taking off with little or no bookings and driving Yin crazy in the process. She doesn’t like an itinerary and wants go with the flow (whatever that means). But don’t get her wrong, she’s done her bit of research and has a general sense of what lies where, what’s good to eat (but indeed) and a few badly mugged up phrases in the local language. If she had her way, she would tailgate those bunch of backpackers with a college tour guide and then loiter around on her own and get lost (which she is excellent at), head to a nearby cafe and chat up with someone over a drink. Her goal is clear: 1 week, no need to rush, just soak up the culture and people and find a local family that serves authentic vegetarian food (oh, the hypocrite).

While I, and the intellectual world in general (club them both if you wish) is biased to the traveller, I don’t see the tourist as having any less fun. The important bit is that both are out there to see a new place in their own way, to take a break from their hectic work-home schedules and to have a wonderful time. Result: both are happy. No conflict.

Unless the tourist and traveller decide to holiday together. They say that Yin & Yang although distinct, show a balance between two opposites with a little bit in each.

In this case, if there’s one thing Yin and Yang love doing, it is sipping malt and watch the world go by.

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For many Indians, Bombay is the city of dreams, of hitting a jackpot and making it big or losing it all and barely surviving. It is far less complicated for me. It is the city where I was born before I moved elsewhere, a city that I visited every summer during my childhood and a city that, despite its chaos and madness, has a special place in my heart for all the memories it holds.

And it was with this nostalgia that I visited Bombay to bring in 2015 and after a gap of 5 long years. It was just as I expected it to be – buzzing with people, a lot more traffic and pollution, old colonial bungalows replaced with 10-storeyed buildings and vendors selling street food with old haunts still intact (on a related note, the father thinks that it is the pollution that lends extra kick to Bombay’s street food. I try to take that with an extra pinch of dust, oops salt).

So after a night of revelry on New Years Eve, I spent a quiet day catching up with cousins and helping them get over my surprise visit. By sunset, it was time to head out for a long drive from the city to town (as the local’s say) and after an impressive route (impressive because of a new link road, pot-hole free as of then) we reached Marine Drive. This is a long stretch of road also known as Queen’s Necklace because, when viewed at night from an elevated point anywhere along the drive, the street lights resemble a string of pearls in a necklace. Some more driving around town to show some of the city’s landmarks (Gateway & Taj of course) to a cousin’s friend and we finally headed back home not before stopping for an absolutely gorgeous chocolate milkshake at Bachelorr’s (their strawberry shake aint too bad either!).

This post is meant to be about ‘Bombay – the city’ but it is clearly gravitating towards ‘Bombay – what I ate’. Uh oh. You may stop now if you wish. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.

Day 2 was a lunch-out with the family and since I was allowed to decide, Burmese was the flavour of the day and we headed out to ‘Busago’ a small resto in Bandra that served excellent kaukswe. One of my fav’ areas in Bombay, Bandra is a quirky suburb mixed with Christian/Parsi old-timers, Bollywood celebrities & yuppies and is a great place for shopping and food (street-side, high-end and in-between). It brought back memories of many a summer evening spent on Linking Road, haggling with vendors, buying pairs & pairs of super-cheap shoes and stuffing ‘selves with chaat.

Talking about chaat, a visit to Juhu beach was mandatory. This is an 18-km stretch along the shores of the Arabian Sea, horribly crowded on weekends, and dotted on one end with food stalls. And so we went, said hello to the beach and headed straight to ‘Siddhivinayak fast food’ 😀 Do not miss, and I emphasise, do not miss the Cheese Pav Bhaji, a mouth-watering bun & gravy combo loaded with butter and cheese. Another momentary glimpse of heaven. Try everything else they may offer but ensure that you end it on a sweet note with kulfi (cut into cubes on a paper plate and not the usual cone; that’s the beauty).

On Day 3, we visited ‘Elco’, another street stall that started out a few decades ago and has now found its clientele and expanded, with even a branch in Dubai! Post Elco, there was room for dessert and after all the consumption, a stroll along Bandra’s famed ‘Bandstand’ helped in much-needed digestion.

I spent the evening of Day 4 hogging on Vada Pav’s, the famed desi-burger that continues to give Big Macs and their clan a run for their money. On the last day, I went scouting for Dabeli, another delightful burger that I haven’t eaten in years and surprisingly hasn’t found presence pan-India. After a lot of searching, found a sandwich-vendor happy to give in to our demands!

I took the flight back as one happy, satisfied kid. There was a 10K run in the offing the week ahead of me and I had gained (more than) adequate energy that I needed for it!

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Rainy days like this are rare in a desert. And when it rains, everyone and everything gets alive and kicking, traffic included.

My ideal rainy day is to wake up as per routine, decide to skip work, snuggle back into bed and much later in the afternoon, go on a long drive, hunting for ‘pakoras‘ n ‘chai’.

Sigh! Back to reality. I did go to work and returned home to a fridge screaming at me to use its week old vegetables.

Result: Parmesan & Roasted Veggie Salad.

It turned out much better than I thought it would. Warm roasted pumpkins, brinjal (or eggplant or aubergine as you wish to call it), juicy red capsicum (okay, so they are called red peppers) and a local variant of zucchini in a balsamic vinegar dressing along with whole wheat pasta for company. Served on a bed of lettuce for some more colour effect. The star of the dish, however, were the Parmesan shavings – a generous, delicious and calorific contribution to an otherwise healthy dish.

No, those spicy Indian fritters cannot replace Parmesan or Pasta nevertheless, a bowl of this goodness provided a comforting end to a drab cold day.

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The timing was perfect. It was the last week of Christmas and I was in India for a brief holiday, to spend quality time with parents. And to reflect how I’d have to spend more time with the blog in 2015. Just reflect; I don’t make resolutions eh.

Immediately after, I get a wordpress notification from 3weeksandashoestring informing me that I’ve been nominated for the Liebster award! Check out her wonderful travel blog and look out for the post on ‘The Hungry Vegetarian’ if you are a vegetarian traveller!

Okay, so Leibster is not really the Oscars, but enough to make me thrilled and do a little dance. No, seriously. It is a nice little accolade to recognize promising blogs and those with less than 500 followers and works on a ‘pay it forward’ system. That’s enough motivation for a blog-rolling 2015.

As the Liebster rules go, every nominated blogger needs to answers a set of questions given by the blogger who’s nominated her / him – so here goes:

1. What do you enjoy most about blogging?

Even if I am blogging about country X that I have recently travelled to, I do some online research to ensure that any facts I include are correct and end up learning a lot more about the place. As a result, I’m building a mini country wikipedia in my brain.

2. What do you find to be the most difficult part of blogging?

I have this obsessive compulsion to not publish a post unless there are a few photos which in reality, takes much more effort than writing a post. And the occasional phase where I have a blog-block and nothing inspires.

3. What is the last place you traveled to?

Just back from India. Visited Coimbatore (in the South) and Bombay/Mumbai. The trip was for family & food 😉

4. What’s your favourite of the places you’ve been to?

Ah, difficult one. But the one that surprised me the most was Georgia. Being so accessible from Dubai, it is a country I’d want to visit a second time around.

5. Of the places you’ve been to, which would you say was the biggest ‘miss’?

None really. While I was disappointed with Dalhousie & Khajjiar in North India (the former in a state of repair and the latter with a needless reference to Switzerland), I have friends who have seen it during snowier times and raved about it. So maybe my timing was wrong.

6. What is your least favorite part of travelling?

The return flight/train/bus back to base. No surprises there.

7. Backpack or wheeled suitcase?

Backpack; but with a back that is getting weaker with age, wheeled suitcase is taking priority.

8. Solo travel or travel with company?

Spouse travel! Because the husb allows me to dominate itinerary, planning & such (only on the travel front, if I may add), is not the most talkative person (which gives me adequate solo time) and yet is listening (or at least pretending to) when I jabber away. Can you see my halo?

9. What is your favourite among the blog posts you have written?

Confession time: I just wish a lot more readers would check my post on Spain & Andalusia. Because that post came straight from the heart.

Can I mention a second one, please? The one on Georgian food, which came straight from the stomach.

No more self-promotion now. Promise.

10. What is the last song you listened to?

Nothing Else Matters – Apocalyptica

11. What is the last book you read?

The Lemon Tree by Sandy Tolan. Read it for a perspective on the Israel-Palestine conflict and for a heart-warming true story that existed amidst it.

11 random facts about me:

I spent 7 months as a English-teaching assistant in Strasbourg, France. From the huge lot of 20-something Indian assistants that left for France, I was the only married 30-something.

Much as I love travelling, I hate packing! I can waste hours sitting aimlessly with an empty backpack or suitcase.

I can be quite cranky during the hours leading to a travel departure. I haven’t yet figured why but I’ll blame this on No.2 for now.

The more number of people visiting a particular country, the lesser my inclination to go there.

My 3rd year in Dubai will include my 3rd 10K run in this city later this month. A hat-trick, inshallah!

I don’t upload travel photo albums on Facebook.

Single child yet, in the words of a wise friend, ‘sorted’.

I have tasted chicken/meat and enjoyed it on 2 occasions. There are several occasions when I get depressed seeing a lone vegetarian option on a menu but that said, I don’t ever intend moving to the other side.

An Indian citizen working in an Arab country for the British Government.

Cold country over warm country. 7 months of Strasbourg and not once did I miss the Indian sun!

Night owl. That’s when all my blogs are written.

Blogs that I will nominate for this Award:

I think the below blogs are great and deserve recognition. I particularly envy bloggers whose pictures speak a thousand words and those with a lucid writing style.

Stéphane at My French Heaven probably has too many followers to be nominated for a blog, nevertheless get inspired by checking out his website.

‘Liebster Award’ rules:

Thank the person who nominated you, and post a link to their blog on your blog.

Display the award on your blog — by including it in your post and/or displaying it using a “widget” or a “gadget”. (Note that the best way to do this is to save the image to your own computer and then upload it to your blog post.)

Answer 11 questions about yourself, which will be provided to you by the person who nominated you.

Provide 11 random facts about yourself.

Nominate 5 –11 blogs that you feel deserve the award, who have less than 500 followers.

Create a new list of questions for the bloggers to answer.

List these rules in your post. Once you have written and published it, you then have to:

Inform the people/blogs that you nominated that they have been nominated for the Liebster award and provide a link for them to your post so that they can learn about it (they might not have ever heard of it!).

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I got Dubai’ed* and booked a night for the husb & me at Fujairah Rotana Resort & Spa. Fujairah is one of the seven emirates that make the UAE and less than 2 hours from Dubai on road, made easier with the recent construction of Sheikh Khalifa highway that beautifully cuts through the jagged Hajar mountains. The landscape is arid and nothing much to rave about (unlike the arid but beautiful one of Leh) nevertheless, the drive was seamless for most part.

The resort sits snugly with the mountains on one side and Gulf of Oman on the other. Not one who’d go about booking ornate resorts or even writing about them, Fujairah Rotana deserves a special mention because of their excellent service and friendly staff. And of course, the location. We even got an upgrade despite a busy November weekend and I cannot help but mention the impressive breakfast buffet that catered to almost every palate. Our room was cozy and came with a balcony facing the pool and the sea view, one that looked particularly incredible at night.

Not much to do in the emirate but for those interested, there is the Al Badiyah Mosque, one of the oldest structures built during the Ottoman Empire. We also happened to pass by an impressive looking Sheikh Zayed Mosque of Fujairah, that somewhat resembles the Hagia Sofia of Istanbul from outside.

In all, a brief but wonderful encounter with Fujairah and one I’d like to escape to every now and then, budget permitting.

Tip: Check Groupon or Cobone websites that offer discounts at the resort. And at Fujairah Resort, do try the absolutely delish Piña colada made by our very own Mr. Pradeep from Kerala land 🙂

*Dubai’ed: residents of the emirate who tend to or can afford to spend more than they really should/need to!

Jwarna is a small village amidst mountains and to get there, we had to first reach Dehradun, Uttarakhand’s capital best known for its schools and defence establishments. We made the most of our only day in the city frequenting local markets and making most of food stalls. After a 3 hour rickety van ride that included churning of gol-gappas and the momos stomached earlier, we reached our ‘Whispering Pines Himalayan Retreat‘ – a retreat which is a whole lot of tents lined across a well-terraced mountain. The place is nicely tucked away from the rest of the world and the locals who manage it were warm & welcoming and took us through a couple of treks including a moon-lit night trek for 2 hours with a soup-break! Which of course brings me to the pahari (mountain) food – fabulous! Made from produce that they grow locally, our meals were delicious to say the least, and made with tons of love. The bonfire-starters were so good that we insisted on visiting the ‘Maharaj’ (as the head chef is called in parts of northern India) and stopped short of shedding tears of joy while thanking him. Thereon we ate-slept-trekked and continued the cycle for 2 nights and had quite a blast.

Then went downhill to the sweltering hot village of Jim Corbett called Choti Haldwani and stayed in a rustic little cottage for another 2 days. The main point of traipsing in this weather was to see the endangered Bengal tigers that are known to come out of their dens to drink water. But then, our efforts to wake up at 5am went to waste as all we spotted were hundreds of deers and other creatures seen otherwise in daily indian life. If you didn’t count the paw-prints of a tiger, that is, which was apparently hiding nearby according to our jeep driver. (We suspect he had these paw print moulds that were used in advance to create some drama for poor desperate tourists like us). The highlight of Corbett, for me, was being surrounded by orchards and orchards of mango trees and other fruits wherever we went. My cousins had the unfortunate task of trying to hold my hands tight lest I tried some monkey acts out of excitement.

And on our last phase, uphill we went again to the beautiful hill-station of Nainital. We stayed in an old british colonial bungalow converted to a hotel, loitered around the famous Mall Road sampling different cuisines, climbed uphill to the Nainital Zoo (at the insistence of the cousin sis who finally saw a siberian tiger albeit caged), went boating in the pear shaped lake that is synonymous to Nainital and soaked in the wonderful weather. It was a fitting end to the holiday!